Blogging: Top 10 Benefits for Small Businesses

Businesses of all sizes need to ensure that they have a strong Internet presence, so that customers can easily find them. Small businesses in specific face more competition, and ensuring that they rank on the first page of a search engine results page is crucial: Potential customers seldom look at the second or third results pages. So how do you increase traffic to your website and get on Google’s first page?

There are many ways to do this (Facebook or Pay-Per-Click advertising), but one method that should not be ignored is blogging. For a small business, there are many different advantages to publishing regular and consistent blogs – here is our Top 10 Benefits of Blogging:

Blogs provide fresh content for your website

People need a reason to keep coming back to you. By blogging regularly, you’ll be adding fresh content to your website, and building a stronger online presence.

Develop relationships with existing and potential customers

I often find that the most interesting part of a blog, are the comments that people make. It’s a great platform that business owners can use to engage with their customers, and receive much needed feedback. At the same time, potential customers are more likely to be convinced into buying a product/service based on the feedback that a blog generates – even the most persuasive and charismatic salesperson can’t do that!

Blogging builds a sense of community

Websites are a form of one-way communication from business to consumer. By adding a blog, you can invite visitors to interact with you and each other – either via the comments section or on social networks. This establishes a sense of community, and encourages people to keep showing their support, which therefore increases customer loyalty.

It’s inexpensive

Blogs are a very low-cost alternative to traditional advertising, and don’t require any tech knowledge such as HTML or designer. Nowadays there are so many tools, resources and templates to use (some even for free!) that are easy to use, and allow business owners to create their own content.

Efficient & streamlines communication

Instead of repeating the same thing to different people (e.g. an update on business promotions), all you have to do is publish 1 blog and send it to everyone at the same time. Not only is this a definite time saver, but it’s also very efficient!

It establishes your authority as an industry leader

If you are able to blog in the right way and make the most of it, you’ll be seen as a valuable source of information. You’ll be considered as an expert in your industry, and again, people will come back for more and this will increase your business’ online presence.

Blogging boosts your business on Search Engines

Search engines loves websites that are constantly being updated and that’s precisely what your are doing by blogging. If you use the right keywords it will also help your site rank highly in the search engines.

It’s a simple web publishing solution

The software is easy to use. Both creating and updating a weblog are faster and cheaper than ever before, and if you ever get stuck, there are video tutorials you can watch on YouTube to answer any questions.

Every post is a new opportunity

Every blog you publish says a bit more about your business and its values, therefore building brand awareness and loyalty. Depending on how fresh, relevant, or interesting your content is, readers will ‘like’ or share it on Facebook, allowing your brand to grow organically.

It helps convert online traffic into solid business leads

If you have a physical shop and people come in to just browse and have a look around, you have no way of knowing who they were or what they were interested in, and more importantly, you have no way of ever finding out!

But once you have traffic coming to your website through your blog, you’re able to have a call-to-action (e.g. Click here for a 10% discount on your next purchase!), which directs people to a page where they have to fill in their details. Once they do this, you can add them to your database, and know how to better target them on future marketing campaigns.

In a nutshell, when done in the right way, blogging will change your business. It’s well worth the effort to add a blog on your website. Don’t believe us? Go onto any website of a company you aspire to, or even your competitors, and make a list of the ones that don’t have a blog. We guarantee it will be a very short list!

Are you interested in creating a blog for your organization? We can help you!!